Dat Brass, a high energy eight piece brass band whose distinctive sound fuses the funky melodies of hard-hitting brass with the hip-hop beats of live drums and rap, have just recorded their debut full length album at the School of Music and Fine Art’s Foundry Studios.

They perform floor filling covers of old school classics as well as lip-spitting originals, and over the last two years have performed gigs at The Garage, Brixton Jamm & 229 The Venue, Alexandra Palace Summer Festival, Roundhouse, London Remixed Festival and Big Feastival. Their latest release, a live covers mixtape of red hot verse and fat horn lines, went live in February 2017. Their next live gig is at the Soundcrash Funk and Soul Weekender at Camber from 12-14 May, and The Great Escape, Brighton on 18 May.

On Sunday 23 April 11.30am-6pm, The Sound of Memory, in the Zilka Auditorium, Whitechapel Gallery, has been organised by The Sound-Image-Space Research Centre, School of Music and Fine Art, University of Kent and the Unit for Sound Practice Research (SPR; Goldsmiths, University of London).

This major symposium is a unique collaboration between music and fine art and brings together filmmakers, artists and composers to explore the broad domain of acoustic ecologies and soundscape’s engagement in place and the aesthetic, philosophical and political approaches of composers working in acoustic ecologies and artists working within social ecologies where the primary engagement is a form of sonic ethnography. Participants include SMFA’s Tim Meacham , Sarah Turner and Aki Pasoulas, as well as John Drever, Hildegard Westerkamp, Matt Parker, Jessie Brennan, William Locryn Finch, Ester Johnson, Gareth Evans and Francesco Bergamo. More info here: http://www.whitechapelgallery.org/events/the-sound-of-memory/

Directed by award-winning artist Sarah Turner, SMFA’s Reader in Fine Art and Director of Research,the Grierson Award nominated film Public House (96 mins, 2016) which premiered in October 2015 at the BFI London Film Festival, and has also been screened at Tate Britain and the ICA, is being toured nationally through Picture House and other cinemas, including the Gulbenkian Cinema on 21 June at 6.45pm.Organized and sponsored by Kent’s Interdisciplinary Centre for Spatial Studies (UKC) and the Gulbenkian Cinema, the film screening will be followed by a Q&A with Sarah Turner, chaired by Thanos Zartaloudis (Kent Law School; AA School of Architecture and Co-director of KISS).

After submitting two entries to the Mural Design Competition organised by the Medway Watersports Trust (The Strand) 3rd year Fine Art student Sharmaine Kwan was delighted that both of her designs were selected to be painted on the car park wall. To see the two time-lapse videos of the work, go to: http://sharmainekwan.wixsite.com/kwan/design

Geoff Waters, Trustee Operations, Medway Watersports Trust commented: “Sharmaine Kwan has designed and painted two high quality murals for the development of Medway Watersports Centre at the Strand Leisure Park in Gillingham, establishing from the outset a high standard for future artists to aspire. It is with much pride that I write to emphasize the impact Sharmaine’s contribution has had on the improved environment for the centre and its adjacent carpark, which will be officially celebrated and formally ‘opened’ by the Sport and Cultural Minister Tracey Crouch MP on Saturday 1 April.”

The unveiling event, to which the press and VIPs were invited, took place at Medway Cruising Club, Approach Road, The Strand, Gillingham, Kent ME7 1ET and will also include watersports, climbing, orienteering, archery, and a family BBQ.